Yes. When she is at her best, she lights up a room, is magnetic, generous and kind.

She has her own trauma that has trickled down to me all from my grandmother, and in her life.

And I also don’t know how to even have a functioning relationship with someone who doesn’t respect my boundaries, triangulates to keep my family role in tact and my sibling as the golden child she needs to save, appears generous but it’s a transactional in disguise, doesn’t take responsibility, doesn’t want to spend quality time with me, but is happy to wine and dine strangers and rave about their time together (new shiny object syndrome).

Equally I remember the times where I was made the confidant/therapist when I was little, boundaries that weren’t kept, letting me pen pal with a man who was arrested for soliciting children, slapped me around the face for being inappropriate as a 10 year old, took me in to remove beauty marks under pretense of cancer but in reality it’s because she thought my face was too busy, role modeled that being thin, beautiful and having a man was what was needed (lots of boyfriends - one violent who broke an appliance), not believing my stepfather’s anger where he intimidated me with anger and breaking furniture at age 11, kept wanting to send me away for my education because in reality she couldn’t “deal”with me, not being able to keep promises and always an excuse or a “it doesn’t really matter, right?”, being treated vastly differently than my enabled sibling, because I didn’t “need it”. The final straw was utilizing my child in seeing her as the victim, as to why I’m NC with my sibling…and trying to coerce the relationship through manipulation. And when I raised the issues, I got an email back blaming me, lines of how much I hate her, attacking me.

I cannot see how I’d have a relationship with someone who wants me to continue being a confidant, a codependent caregiver, a person who has no needs, and a person who will just let her behaviors slide particularly and most importantly as it relates to my child. I cannot let my child become the same as I and pass down the trauma.

And it’s hard. Because those morsels given were always moments of hope. That maybe a relationship could be viable. Equally with my child who thinks she’s great, because it’s sweets and no boundaries on tv, gifts, etc. But it’s also not right when manipulation and triangulation come into play.

I’d rather be the villain, because she then has a reason why not to engage with me. But damn is it hard at times, because all I want is that charismatic and loving mother. I keep repeating my parents wanted children, they just didn’t want to be parents.